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Letters Fifteenth Sunday
in Ordinary Time |
The Catholic Telegraph
July 13, 2001This reading begins a series of four consecutive selections from Paul’s letter to the Colossians. Colossae was an unimportant little town that Paul had never even visited. Its people had been evangelized by Paul’s colleague Epaphras. Paul, now in prison somewhere, has learned from Epaphras that there are problems in Colossae. Some unhealthy teachings are being circulated there. These heterodox teachings included a call to observe certain Jewish practices such as circumcision and the celebration of special days and seasons. But more troublesome were the pagan elements of the heresy. The Colossians were being asked to believe that certain angelic beings, each of them containing a part of the fulness of divinity, had control over human affairs and even over all creation. If you wanted to appease these super-beings and keep them happy you had to get possession of certain specialized kinds of "knowledge." Since these ideas undermine the full role of Christ as Lord of the universe, Paul’s corrective letter to the Colossians concerns itself primarily with the nature and mission of Christ.
He is barely finished with the opening formalities of the letter when he launches into what sounds like a grand finale, one of the most important theological and beautiful statements about the person of Christ in the whole New Testament. This is our reading. Scholars think that these verses were originally a Christian hymn. The hymn may have undergone some editing by Paul. In any case, it constitutes the doctrinal highpoint of the letter. The whole rest of Colossians is a kind of reflection on what is said here.
The hymn is presented to us in two strophes or verses. The first has to do with Christ’s role in creation. He is the Lord and master of it all. Whatever came from the creative will of the Father finds expression and visibility in Christ. In Him and through Him and for Him everything came into being. He is its pattern and its purpose. Paul offers his readers a list of the aspects of creation to which Christ is superior: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, thrones, dominions, principalities and powers. (These last are seemingly some of the super-beings that the Colossians were concerned about.) Christ is prior to all of this and gives it all unity and meaning.
In the second verse of the hymn we hear about Christ’s role in redemption, in undoing the harm to creation that had been done by sin. As the first to rise from the dead, Christ was the beginning of a new kind of life. Just as He was the instrument and purpose of creation, so is He of redemption, and is thus outstanding in every sphere. The church, the community of faith, finds its unity and direction in Him alone. Because the totality of godliness is in Him, everything, on earth or in heaven, comes together and finds its ultimate significance in Him. His gift of Himself on the cross brings everything back together again.
This passage is one of those pages of the Bible that are almost inexpressibly rich. No matter how often we have read it or reflected on it, new insights still present themselves, new depths that we had not noticed before.
Implicit in these verses is a whole theology of the Trinity: the Son as full reflection of the Father, the image of the Father in which every expression of God is already contained. Because all creation somehow includes likeness to God, all creation includes likeness to Christ, the Son of God. He is the model and therefore the master of it all.
Also contained in these verses is a theology of redemption. We are redeemed because we are like Him. That likeness to Him, that sharing in His risen life is what puts us in touch with the Father as well as with all the other redeemed who make up His body, the Church. The whole purpose of redemption was to bring sinful creation into oneness in Him. He brings earth and heaven together in the unity of His person.
But this breathtaking theology is not just a matter of lofty speculation. It has its implications for each one of us, here and now. In this passage God’s word is teaching us that the worth and value of everything and of everyone comes in and through Christ, and that nothing makes any sense except in Him. Our world has meaning and beauty because it is a reflection of Him. Other human beings are to be respected and protected because of their relationship with Him. Everything from the vastness of the created universe to the limitless realms of the human spirit, "all things in heaven and on earth, the visible and the invisible" fit together, have sense and worth, only in Him. This is the Christ who offers Himself to us in the sacraments of the Church and its teachings, in the word of Sacred Scripture, in the quiet of personal prayer. He is Jesus of Nazareth, but His is also the cosmic Christ. He is the Lord of the universe, but He is also our brother and friend.
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Conversation Questions
Is Christ sovereign Lord of my life?
Where do I see Christ in the world? In the Church?
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